day 2 juice fast

It's a cold day today. woke up at 8:45 - slept well - better than the last few weeks, very grateful for that. I went downstairs around 9:30 after having done my morning meditations. wasn't hungry much but was experiencing sinus drainage in my right sinus. This is the nostril that has been bugging me for a couple of weeks now - the air is so dry and the woodstove is drying. I have been keeping water on the stove for steam and a humidifier going on top of that but still, the insides of my nose is dry and cracked. I've been using the neti pot and also using ALL HEAL SALVE to help moisturize my nose and this morning, it was draining a bit. I had about 16 oz of tea this morning - did the smooth move again - not really sure why exactly except, I have this notion in me that it's good for me to clear all this shit out (metaphorically and literally speaking!) LOL Somewhere around 11:30 or so I made a big juice. I looked at the greens and fruit that I have on hand and the oranges were still speaking to me. This is interesting because I haven't had citrus in AGES. morning juice: 1 stalk celery 1 bunch kale 6 oranges I slurped it all down and it was quite yummy. we took the dogs out and then I decided to ride the bike. I did 50 minutes on the stationary bike, level 12 (out of 16) on the cross training program. It felt very good to get on the bike and ride. It's a recumbant bike which has been very helpful for my back and sacrum over the years. Still, one day, I hope to have a stair master. I love those things. after the bike, I took a hot bubbly epsom salt bath. I languished in it while I read and read. I could have stayed in there for hours but a knock on my door told me it was time to get out. I made another juice around 3:30. it's wild - I go from completely satiated to incredibly hungry very very quickly. When I got out of the tub, I felt famished. afternoon juice: 4 ounces radish sprouts 2 stalks celery 6 oranges I don't know what it is, but those oranges were still speaking to me. I drank down that delicious juice and went over to a woman's group that I belong to. Had a wonderful couple of hours of sharing and support with phenomenal women and then walked home. It was around 6:30 when I got home and probably because of the dinner smells in the house, I got extremely hungry. I decided to have a savory juice since those things are so friggin satisfying on juice fasts for dinner experiences. This juice was delicious. dinner juice: 2 stalks celery 1 bunch kale 1 zucchini 4 carrots then I put it in a blender and added 1/2 avocado and a small bit of raw marinara sauce that needed to get eaten or else it would go bad. I also added some dulse and a spoonful of miso. It was absolutely delicious. Tasted like an italian dinner. This really helps me to feel sated and not deprived. About an hour after dinner, I decided to have more tea. This time throat coat tea - it tastes delicious and is sweet all on its own. It's a cold night and the house is cold despite the wood stove going so the tea feels good in my hands and in my mouth. Some observations thus far: 1) Aside from the drainage of sinus and also the um need to be near the bathroom, I am doing quite well thus far. I don't think I've gone on a fast where I've had to use the bathroom as much and I know that the tea is helping (although I've never had that fast a response from that tea before.) OK, TMI. Anyway, we'll see what the next day brings but so far, so good. I'm not sure how long I'll do this for - no more than 7 days, maybe less. I'm going to play this by ear and take each day in earnest. 2) I'm sensing some clarity which I'm very grateful for... Circumstances in my life have been full, intense and at times emotional. I was hoping to go away and have time to think and have someone else take care of food and other things for me but I'm finding a way to do that myself. I was also noticing that when the going was getting rough, I was finding that I was not responding the way I wanted to. Wayne Dyer has a great saying and it goes like this: When you squeeze an apple, all you'll ever get is apple juice. When you squeeze an orange, you'll get orange juice. What happens when you get squeezed? what comes out of you? Well for me, I was noticing that I was turning pretty sad and mad at myself and that shit just had to change. 3) I am getting a sense of rebooting the system. I was mentally and physically feeling stuck for almost a month and feeling as though I was spiraling down to a place I didn't want to be. Physically I was experiencing some kind of crazy immune response - maybe it was the dry weather coupled with stress but I was getting little tiny bumps on my fingers and toes in the last few weeks. By the time of this writing, these bumps are nearly gone (only 2 days of juice feasting!) Whoever says that this is bull-melarky needs to try it for themselves in earnest. It's pretty amazing. My nose is way better tonight than it's been the last 3 weeks. I'm very grateful for this. 4) It's pretty darn easy this time to juice and drink. I've asked Matt if he can handle the dinners for him/the kids this week and that I think will make things easier for me. I'm not putting a whole lot of thought into this. I'm just reaching for things that seem appealing to me and doing them. I'm not staying to some strict amount and I really enjoyed the half of avocado tonight so I'll do that again if it seems like a good thing to do. I'm drinking a minimum of 96 oz of juice - more like 100 oz and also drinking tea or water but (not surprisingly) I'm not that thirsty for extra liquids. 5) I was wondering how doing this in the winter would be and so far, so good. I'll keep you posted. I don't believe the hype that we need hot food in the winter. I tend to think that if we eat things that are easily digestible then our bodies are not bogged down in the digestion process as much and can put more emphasis into things like circulation. Think about how tired you feel after a heavy meal, it's because the body slows other things down in order to put a big focus on the stomach to digest the food. I'm not saying that is a terrible feeling - I'm just saying that it would be hard for the body to have to keep warm, digest meals and do other things like keep immune systems up and healthy. I still get cold when I eat raw foods - I just find that I don't get that shut down feeling that I do when I eat heavy cooked meals that weigh me down and make me sleepy. I tend to feel VERY cold after a cooked meal at night. Even when that meal has curry or ginger in it... 6) So far, I'm not missing all the sweets and chocolate I've been eating lately. No matter how far I've come with emotional eating, I still have triggers - when stress comes, I notice that I tend towards sweets. And the past few months, I've been going gang busters with sweets (compared with how I normally like to eat, or how I eat when I feel the very best in my body.) I sort of think this takes a toll on the liver as well as immune function. We know that eating sugar suppresses the immune system. We also know that sugar feeds/fuels things like obesity and disease. We can gravitate to sweet tastes for many reasons. I learned that fruits are the cleansers for the body and greens are the healers. I know many fruitarians that espouse great things from eating a diet of mainly fruit. I'm not there, however, I like not making fruit evil. It seems to me that if ripe fruit was so bad, nature wouldn't have created it for us to eat. I would love to see the studies on how fruit and green juices help in healing. Maybe one day I'll be a part of a study in some way. I write this from my experience doing this... So, ok - I'm rambling. It's nice to get some of these thoughts out. More tomorrow.